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Failure to understand something is not a virtue. That it does get a lot of love strongly suggests that there are reasons for that. Of course it has flaws, but t

by jibal 1y ago

Failure to understand something is not a virtue. That it does get a lot of love strongly suggests that there are reasons for that. Of course it has flaws, but that alone doesn't tell us anything; only comparisons do. Create a comprehensive pro/con list and see how it fares. Then compare that to pro/con lists for other languages.

9rx 1y ago
> Of course it has flaws, but that alone doesn't tell us anything; only comparisons do. Comparisons won't tell us anything. If Python were the only programming language in existence, that doesn't imply that it would be loved. Or, if we could establish that Python is the technically worst programming language to ever be created, that doesn't imply that wouldn't be loved. Look at how many people in the world love other people who are by all reasonable measures bad for them (e.g. abusive). Love isn't rational. It is unlikely that it is possible for us to truly understand.
- jibal 1y ago
  > Comparisons won't tell us anything. If you insist. > If Python were the only programming language in existence, that doesn't imply that it would be loved. I'm not here to defend bizarre strawmen. > It is unlikely that it is possible for us to truly understand. If you insist.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - jibal 1y ago
    Perhaps I shouldn't have been snide, and should instead have straightforwardly explained how gawdawful their reasoning was.
deleted 1y ago
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xelxebar 1y ago
> That it does get a lot of love strongly suggests that there are reasons for that. Reasons, sure, but whether those reasons correlate with things that matter is a different question altogether. Python has a really strong on-ramp and, these days, lots of network effects that make it a common default choice, like Java but for individual projects. The rub is that those same properties—ones that make a language or codebase friendly to beginners—also add friction to expert usage and work. > Failure to understand something is not a virtue. This is what I want to say to all the Bash-haters that knee-jerk a "you should use a real language like Python" in the comments to every article that shows any Bash at all. It's a pet peeve of mine.
- jibal 1y ago
  "Reasons, sure, but whether those reasons correlate with things that matter is a different question altogether." Thus my word "suggests". Thus the comprehensive pro/con list. I'm not here to defend tiresome strawmen.
  - xelxebar 1y ago
    It's not so much a matter of exhaustively listing pros and cons, but more a matter of appropriateness to the desired goal or goals IME. I seriously doubt that a comprehensive pro/con list can even be coherent. Is dynamic typing a pro or a con? Depends on to whom and even in what decade you ask. List comprehensions? Interpreted language? First class OOP? Any cost-benefit anaylsis will be highly context-dependent. > I'm not here to defend tiresome strawmen. I won't point out that you already tried to (contradiction intended). Perhaps a more interesting discussion would result if we defaulted to a more collaborative[0] stance here? [0]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle
    - aquariusDue 1y ago
      I don't have anything useful to add per se but I'd like to thank you for validating my intuition that pros and cons lists not only don't generalize as to be useful universally but also that the more "rigorous" you get with it the whole things evolves into an exercise of ridiculousness. An example I like to give is the wood chipper. Pros it can do a lot of useful things around the yard (that you can list individually), cons it can chop your arm off. How many pros do you need to overcome that con? Though I'll admit there's a difference between "can" and "will", the latter hinging on improper use. tl;dr I'm a bit tired with people glorifying a semi-useful cognitive device.

by jibal 1y ago

9rx 1y ago

> Of course it has flaws, but that alone doesn't tell us anything; only comparisons do. Comparisons won't tell us anything. If Python were the only programming language in existence, that doesn't imply that it would be loved. Or, if we could establish that Python is the technically worst programming language to ever be created, that doesn't imply that wouldn't be loved. Look at how many people in the world love other people who are by all reasonable measures bad for them (e.g. abusive). Love isn't rational. It is unlikely that it is possible for us to truly understand.

jibal 1y ago
> Comparisons won't tell us anything. If you insist. > If Python were the only programming language in existence, that doesn't imply that it would be loved. I'm not here to defend bizarre strawmen. > It is unlikely that it is possible for us to truly understand. If you insist.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- jibal 1y ago
  Perhaps I shouldn't have been snide, and should instead have straightforwardly explained how gawdawful their reasoning was.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

xelxebar 1y ago

> That it does get a lot of love strongly suggests that there are reasons for that. Reasons, sure, but whether those reasons correlate with things that matter is a different question altogether. Python has a really strong on-ramp and, these days, lots of network effects that make it a common default choice, like Java but for individual projects. The rub is that those same properties—ones that make a language or codebase friendly to beginners—also add friction to expert usage and work. > Failure to understand something is not a virtue. This is what I want to say to all the Bash-haters that knee-jerk a "you should use a real language like Python" in the comments to every article that shows any Bash at all. It's a pet peeve of mine.

jibal 1y ago
"Reasons, sure, but whether those reasons correlate with things that matter is a different question altogether." Thus my word "suggests". Thus the comprehensive pro/con list. I'm not here to defend tiresome strawmen.
- xelxebar 1y ago
  It's not so much a matter of exhaustively listing pros and cons, but more a matter of appropriateness to the desired goal or goals IME. I seriously doubt that a comprehensive pro/con list can even be coherent. Is dynamic typing a pro or a con? Depends on to whom and even in what decade you ask. List comprehensions? Interpreted language? First class OOP? Any cost-benefit anaylsis will be highly context-dependent. > I'm not here to defend tiresome strawmen. I won't point out that you already tried to (contradiction intended). Perhaps a more interesting discussion would result if we defaulted to a more collaborative[0] stance here? [0]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle
  - aquariusDue 1y ago
    I don't have anything useful to add per se but I'd like to thank you for validating my intuition that pros and cons lists not only don't generalize as to be useful universally but also that the more "rigorous" you get with it the whole things evolves into an exercise of ridiculousness. An example I like to give is the wood chipper. Pros it can do a lot of useful things around the yard (that you can list individually), cons it can chop your arm off. How many pros do you need to overcome that con? Though I'll admit there's a difference between "can" and "will", the latter hinging on improper use. tl;dr I'm a bit tired with people glorifying a semi-useful cognitive device.